Christian Conference Controversy: Where Are the Women?

In case you missed it, there was some heated conversation in the evangelical “blogosphere” and news media this week.

It started when Rachel Held Evans questioned why there were only 4 women speakers out of 112 for The Nines online church conference. The ensuing Twitter conversation between Rachel and producer Todd Rhoades was telling, as this excerpt shows:

The issue of diverse representation in church leadership is an important one.

In a Christianity Today article, Jeremy Weber gives a concise overview of the whole controversy and reports that Rhoades eventually did some back-peddling, even extending an invitation to Rachel so speak at the next conference. Australian evangelist Christine Caine, one of the few women who did speak, made some insightful observations on the restrictive environment women face in the American church and suggested some ways to move forward.

This weekend one of our writers is interviewing Dr. Gilbert Bilezikian, professor emeritus of biblical studies at Wheaton College, author of Beyond Sex Roles: What the Bible Says a Woman’s Place in Church and Family, and a founding member of Christians for Biblical Equality. In preparing our questions for Dr. B (as he is affectionately known) one thing we are hoping he will address is why some evangelical groups have become more conservative on the issue of women in the home and the church in recent years. In the meantime, David Hayward addressed this question on his blog, suggesting that:

“The more dissenting an opposing group becomes, the more fundamentalist the group in power becomes. This is why we are witnessing the simultaneous growth of radical dissent and radical fundamentalism. If you’re keeping up with the rapid daily reports, you must agree this is happening with women in the church.”

God is up to something!

As we watch the news and observe conversations in the “blogosphere”, it seems evident that God is up to something in regard to the issue of women in the church. At the very least, new conversations and questions are surfacing on a regular basis. These conversations about the status of women in faith communities are not just coming from the evangelical world; they are also being discussed in Mormon, Catholic, and Jewish circles.

Let’s continue to add our voices to those important conversations, as tiresome and frustrating as they can be.
———————————————————————————————————-Your Turn: In a future post we will address this issue of women’s voices in the public Christian square. In the meantime, we’d love to hear your thoughts and ideas!

is a co-founder of The Junia Project and the Associate Pastor at Foothill Free Methodist Church in Azusa. A former MK from Japan, she lives in southern California with her husband of 42 years, and enjoys spending time with her family, especially her five grandkids! She holds a B.S.N. and M.A. from Azusa Pacific University and a Ph.D. from Walden University. The focus of her graduate studies included Christian education, adult development and learning, women’s development, and spiritual formation. Gail also holds a Certificate in Theology from Princeton Theological Seminary.

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About Gail Wallace

is a co-founder of The Junia Project and the Associate Pastor at Foothill Free Methodist Church in Azusa. A former MK from Japan, she lives in southern California with her husband of 42 years, and enjoys spending time with her family, especially her five grandkids! She holds a B.S.N. and M.A. from Azusa Pacific University and a Ph.D. from Walden University. The focus of her graduate studies included Christian education, adult development and learning, women’s development, and spiritual formation. Gail also holds a Certificate in Theology from Princeton Theological Seminary.

Comments

You might consider interviewing Linda Belleville, Ph.D., author of “Women Leaders in the Church: Three Crucial Questions” and several other works supporting women in church leadership and egalitarianism in general. The book I’ve mentioned still serves as a foundation for much of what continues to be written on the topic, 13 years after its initial publication. She has some interesting stories to tell about complementarian scholars changing their minds and becoming egalitarians as they tried to defend the complementarian position for a then-upcoming book on differing views!

Robin, we agree that Linda Belleville’s work is foundational, especially with regard to 1 Timothy 2. I gave the book you mention to my 80 year old dad (retired pastor and missionary). His comment after reading it was “wow, there sure are a lot of issues with that 1 Timothy 2 passage!”. Yes, there are! I saw on Facebook that she is a friend of yours – please tell her how much we appreciate her foundational work!

Charity, I’m confused. I don’t see any feminist comments related to that article. As you probably know, there are many forms and branches of feminism, including biblical and Christian feminism which hold a high view of scripture. Many of us here at The Junia Project identify to some degree to with feminist thought. Personally, I’m thankful for CT’s more moderate approach. There are Christian publications that lean more to the right (World) and those that lead more to the left (Christian Century). Maybe you could clarify your question?

Wow! Talk about major patronizing. Hey Todd, do you really think those are the only areas on which I can give you a new perspective? Obviously you need a new perspective on too many areas to mention here.

I think that while we have enormous inequity in who is allowed to pastor churches and, in some cases, teach in seminaries (yes, Southern Baptist Convention, I’m thinking of you!), we will always have these lopsided lists of conference speakers, simply because a woman has very few venues in which to become known as a good speaker.

I could very well be the best speaker in Western Australia, but who’s going to know it? It’s not as if my conservative church will allow me to preach. (Yes, there are less conservative denominations out there I could move to, but these are not where I feel at home in other regards.) The realities of the post-seminary employment situation keeps plenty of women from bothering to start studies in the first place. I keep looking longingly at Masters degree programs, but have to keep reminding myself that if I do a higher degree, it’s going to have to be useful. If we were rich and I didn’t have to work, I would go study regardless and just enjoy the opportunity to learn.

While this is the situation for many gifted and called women, we’ll continue to see a lack of women on conference platforms, just as we see a lack of them in pastoral positions outside of children’s ministry.

Bronwen, you are reading my mind. I think the conference circuit relies on the most polished and experienced speakers for their success, i.e. “the cream of the crop”. In addition to the issue of women having very few venues in which to develop speaking gifts, there are many other factors in play here, some external and some internal. Hoping to write more on that soon! And like you, I decided against seminary years ago realizing I would have more opportunity in higher education; a much more woman-friendly environment than the church. How sad is that?

Its so frustrating and sad. I left the SBC church I attended for many years when God revealed the spiritual abuse inflicted on women within its walls. Since then I’ve floundered living in an area that is saturated with SBC churches and only a handful of egalitarian opportunities. The entire issue requires a radical approach. Maybe this conference did spotlight well known speakers…now that it is evident a more balanced lineup would better serve the Christian community the conference organizers can easily remedy that….I can think of ten women in my former church alone who would rock a discussion, class sermon, lecture and would do so of invited and more importantly advised of how important this is to allow Gods voice to speak through all of his children, men and women alike.

When I originally started theological training (which I didn’t finish) back in the 90s, some of the significant older figures in my denomination who encouraged me were of the opinion that in my generation, things were set to change. I can’t see that they have. While there have been a handful of women senior pastors in this and another very similar denomination of which I am now a member, I think I could successfully identify every church in these two denominations in our entire state which would accept women in such a role. I think there is greater discomfort about the lack of opportunity for women among more people in churches than there used to be, on the whole, most people just tend to feel it is “unfair/unjust” but have no decent biblical basis to back that up with. Would love to run a Bible study to help them in their confusion, but have to be rather careful, as I am employed by my church. So I’m watching and waiting to see what opportunities God brings my way to help those who are looking for the kinds of answers biblical equality will provide.

I so look forward to your interview of Dr. B. His book was so helpful to me 20 years ago and was on the list of required reading for Dr. David Scholer’s class on Women in Ministry, which was a phenomenal class to take. It’s intriguing to me that Dr. B’s former school has become even more vocally conservative on this issue in recent years. Thanks for your encouraging presence in cyberspace, friends. This is important. I’m just so sorry it is still necessary.

I saw the conversations, and it occurred to me that a lot of physical body parts are necessary to preach… lungs and vocal cords (or hands for sign language), mouth and tongue and teeth, diaphragm to pull in air, spine to hold you upright… eyes to see if anyone is there to preach to (or a keen sense of hearing!) and in all my thinking, I could not discern any possible contribution from reproductive organs. 🙂 Those who think they need male ones to be allowed to preach aren’t using them correctly. 🙂 Just my musings… 🙂

Phil. 3:3 says that we are “not to put any confidence in the flesh”…. yet isn’t this exactly what is happening when women are disqualified from leadership/preaching opportunities simply because they lack certain body parts?